2021 Program Archives

October 16, 2021: Slow, Slow, Stitch, Stitch Slow Workshop with Angela Daymond

Angela Daymond's Slow, Slow, Stitch, Stitch Slow workshop.

Angela’s workshop is scheduled for Saturday, October 16th from 9:00am-12:00pm. Workshop will be limited to 15 participants, cost is $25.00.

Registration will be through Eventbrite and the link will be included in the DAFA September newsletter along with materials list for the workshop.

Link to EventBrite to come.

About the Workshop
In this workshop you will combine different textures and colours of fabrics to create a background ready for stitching. This workshop is all about learning how therapeutic and relaxing hand stitching can be whilst creating your very own masterpiece.

You will combine traditional Kantha stitching alongside Japanese boro stitch with a sprinkling of embroidery stitches thrown into the mix. The combinations that cottons, silks and linens with varying thicknesses of threads will give endless design possibilities. You will be sent a pattern sheet to use which will include one of Angela’s iconic hares but you can of course follow your own ideas.

About Angela

Based in the United Kingdom, Angela is a textile artist and teacher who specializes in kantha stitching and natural dyeing. I love the simplicity of kantha work that you can take needle, thread and fabric, and combine with just one stitch, the running stitch, to create abstract and representational images with lots of texture.

She has had her work exhibited on a number of occasions including at Lincoln Cathedral, Sam Scorer Gallery, The Carre Gallery in Sleaford, Tranmer House in Sutton Hoo and the Yarrow Gallery in Oundle. She has also had a number of articles on natural dyeing and stitched projects published in national craft magazines.

Tea Bags and Rope

Libby's presentation will dive deep into the unusual art quilts that she has made using metal hardware cloth, used tea bags, and rope as “batting”.

She will share process shots of the engineering and construction of these pieces, and discuss lessons she has learned and challenges she has overcome. Get a close up look at these unique pieces and join an interactive discussion about how they were made.

About Libby

Libby Williamson, a mixed-media fiber artist living in Southern California, pushes the boundaries of her art, incorporating metal, rope, paint, vintage relics, used tea bags and a wide variety of fabrics and fibers into her work. She relishes the challenge of constructing fiber art that entails stitching (with pliers) through rigid and coarse materials. Though technically quilts, her works are rarely categorized as such.Williamson’s award-winning work has been exhibited internationally in numerous invitational and juried exhibits, textile and art museums. She has traveled the US for many years as a teaching artist, presenting workshops at guilds, museums, shops, and destination art retreats, and has recently offered online workshops as a way to reach her students throughout the 2020 global quarantine.

Williamson has published a variety of articles with Quilting Arts Magazine, including cover artwork on Fiber Arts Now and Quilting Arts Magazines. She has appeared on a series of episodes of Quilting Arts TV, and has been featured on THE QUILT SHOW with Alex Anderson and Ricky Tims.

Libby Williamson is a Juried Artist Member with Studio Art Quilt Associates and holds professional affiliations with Surface Design Association, Textile Artists of Los Angeles, Visions Art Museum, Craft Industry Alliance and Global Quilt Connection.

Painting with thread: a conversation with artist Rebecca Shewmaker.

Shewmaker will discuss her art making process and techniques as well as her experiences as an artist-in-residence for two national parks during the Covid-19 pandemic.

About Rebecca

Rebecca Shewmaker is an artist who uses sewing and embroidery techniques to create landscape paintings from fabric and thread. Beginning with hand-dyed cotton fabric, she sews layers of stitches to create a textured image. She grew up in North Texas and is inspired by the beauty and color of the area.

Shewmaker holds a Bachelor of Arts in Art History and Visual Arts from Rice University (2006) and a Master of Fine Arts in Painting and Intermedia from Texas Woman’s University (2018), where she also taught Art Appreciation, Watercolor, and Basic Drawing classes. She has been an artist-in-residence for the Woodstock Byrdcliffe Guild in New York, Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona, and Zion National Park in Utah, and has given numerous embroidery and fiber art demonstrations and workshops. Her work has been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions in Dallas, Houston, Kentucky, New Jersey, Indiana, and Georgia. She is currently represented by Craighead Green Gallery in Dallas.

Inside Devil's Hall

Mathematics and Symmetry in Textile Patterns

Imagine all the designs ever created by all the artisans, from every culture in the world, in all of human history.

It’s staggering to think of the variety of patterns available to these creative minds.

Now, narrow your focus to consider just those patterns artists might use to make borders: long repeating designs on wallpaper borders, or skirt hems, or samplers, or lengths of lace, or tiles, or rugs. 

And yet, if you narrow your focus just one level further, to the single design element of symmetry, an amazing fact emerges. If you consider border patterns and the mathematical symmetries they allow, there are only seven distinct patterns available to use! How can this be, and how might we as designers or artists use the knowledge of these patterns to enhance our creative capacity? Mathematics has the answer to why there are only seven types and you will be able to see the explanations come to life!

About Evita

Evita Tezeno is a Port Arthur, Texas native, and graduate of Lamar University. She lives and works in Dallas.

Selected solo exhibitions include Better Days (2021) at Luis De Jesus Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA; Evita Tezeno and Jas Mardis: Sharing Memories (2021) at ArtCentre of Plano, Plano, TX; Memories Create Our Yesterdays and Tomorrows (2019) at Thelma Harris Gallery, Oakland, CA; Memories That Speak To My Soul (2018) at Stella Jones Gallery, New Orleans, LA; and Thoughts of Time Gone By (2017) at Peg Alston Gallery, New York, NY.

Selected group exhibitions include Réinterprétation (2020) at C.O.A. Contemporary Art Gallery, Montreal, Canada; Phenomenal Women #UsToo (2019) at the African American Museum, Dallas, TX; Love in the Time of Hysteria (2019) at Prism Art Fair, Miami, FL; Flagrant Rules of Ensued Emancipation (2019) at John Milde Gallery, Dallas, TX; Modern Day Muse (2019) at Plano ArtCenter, Plano, TX; Arts Past & Present (2018) at the George Bush H.W. Presidential Library and Museum; Dallas, TX; Daughter of Diaspora – Women of Color Speak (2018) at Hearne Fine Art , Hot Springs, AR; and New Power Generation (2012) curated by Myrtis Bedolla at Hampton University Museum, Hampton, VA.

Tezeno’s work has been acquired by prominent collectors, entertainers, media personalities and athletes, including Samuel L. Jackson, David Hoberman, Denzel Washington, Star Jones, Susan L. Taylor, David Driskell, Denise Rich, and Mark McLemore among others.  In addition, her work is included in the permanent collection of the African American Museum in Dallas, Texas, the Embassy of the Republic of Madagascar, Washington D.C., and Daimler-Chrysler Collection in Auburn Hills, MI.

Her work has been featured in numerous publications and media outlets, including Visionary Art Collective, NBC 5-DFW, Document Journal, Black Art in America, Collective Arts Network Journal, The Dallas Examiner, D Magazine, Dallas Woman, North Dallas Gazette, Fort Worth Star Telegram, Dallas Morning News, Eclipse Magazine, ONYX Magazine, The Shreveport Times, and MAG-RAW Creations, among others.

Tezeno is the recipient of the prestigious Elizabeth Catlett Award for The New Power Generation. She has been awarded commissions by INC 500, The Links- Dallas, the Essence Music Festival in New Orleans, The Deep Ellum Film Festival in Dallas, and the legendary New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival ("Jazz Fest") where in 1999, she became the first female artist to design its celebrated poster.

Better Days

Employing richly patterned hand-painted papers and found objects in a contemporary folk-art style, Evita Tezeno's colorful collage paintings on canvas and rag board depict a cast of characters in harmonious everyday scenes. Inspired by her family and friends, childhood memories in South Texas, personal dreams and moments from her adult life—and influenced by the great 20th century modernists Romare Bearden, Elizabeth Catlett, and William H. Johnson—scenes of joy animate her vision of a Black America filled with humanity.

The theme of timelessness emerges—a carefree life, united and strengthened by love, tradition, and spirituality evoking the past in portraits that are both idealized and hopeful. Evita Tezeno's work is a powerful affirmation of African American life. Characterized by its simplicity and whimsy, it reflects a strength of character developed in centuries-old rituals and customs, such as storytelling, spirituals, gospel music and the blues. Her vision can be understood as an act of self-definition that allows the black tradition to speak for itself. 

Tezeno’s creative process begins with sketches and lush textures and patterns painted onto paper using acrylic paint, watercolor, crayon, and various other mediums and techniques. She traces and cuts out shapes and arranges them to form the face and various parts of the figure, the clothing, and the landscape elements in the background. The works in Better Days portray intimate moments: couples holding hands in silence or singing a song, or snapshots of everyday scenes, such as friends waiting at a bus stop or enjoying a walk under a bright midday sun. Devoid of pain, her characters are filled with a sense of nobility and tenderness.

Plastic Nature

Here’s a creative way to help clean up our planet: make art from single-use plastic bags. Collect plastic bags for a few weeks and you’ll discover a myriad of colors, thicknesses, patterns and textures available to you. With Natalya’s guidance, you’ll make art inspired by nature from the plastic bags you’ve gathered. Natalya’s will show you how to prepare the plastic, cut it and stitch it by hand and machine. You will experiment with different types of stitching and finishes and create an artwork like no other.

Workshop Details and How to Register

$30 DAFA Member plus EventBrite fee of $3.46 (must be a member as of March 1, 2021) Payment in full is required at time of registration.

$40 Non-Member plus EventBrite fee of $4.06 (non-member registration opens March 23, 2021). Payment in full is required at time of registration.

2 workshop sessions are available. Please select only one session | 9am – 12pm | 1pm – 4pm. Be aware that your first choice may be full.

Registration ends Wednesday, April 7.

Click on the link below to download the Plastic Nature Workshop Supply List pdf.

Important Workshop Dates

Monday, March 8     

Member registration starts

Monday, March 22   

Member meeting, announcement that non-member registration starts on Tuesday, March 23, member registration continues

Tuesday, March 23 

If spaces are available, non-member registration starts, member registration continues.

Wednesday, April 7

Registration ends

Saturday, April 17   

Workshops

Monday, April 26

DAFA meeting with Workshop Show and Tell. All attendees of the workshop are invited to this meeting to show their artwork created in the workshop.

Download Plastic Nature Workshop Supply List pdf

February 22, 2021:  The Stage Play: An Analogy for Layering and Design Development, a presentation by Jane Dunnewold

The Stage Play: An Analogy for Layering and Design Development

The organization of any film, television sitcom, or stage play is a model for the compositions we create in fiber, paint, clay or mixed media. There is a background. There is a supporting cast, and there are stars. Sometimes just one major star and sometimes two who share the leading role. And then we also have the ensemble production, where every character plays an important part. Learn to analyze your own work from the perspective of the Stage Play Analogy. This is an entertaining lecture with light-hearted moments but your approach to making will never be the same!

Jane Dunnewold teaches and lectures internationally, and has mounted numerous solo exhibitions, including Inspired by the Masters (Texas Quilt Museum (2018) – also slated for exhibition at the National Quilt Museum in 2019. A second mixed media series featuring re-purposed quilt blocks and gold leaf was exhibited at the McNay Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas (2017) and more recently at the Armory Art Center in West Palm Beach, FL.

Jane’s work won Best of Show in the exhibition Timeless Meditations (Tubac Art Center/2013). She is a recipient of the Quilt Japan Prize, and Gold Prize at the Taegue (Korea) International Textile Exhibition. The San Antonio Art League named Dunnewold Artist of the Year for 2019. Jane is currently offering a ten month Creative Strength Training course online.

Repurpose Magic

Learn how to turn a pocket from your old jeans into a glamorous heirloom treasure with JoAnn Musso! These are awesome!

JoAnn’s passion for couture sewing and teaching led her to pursue a career as a wearable fiber artist, utilizing her decades of experience in couture sewing, garment design, and construction. She joined DAFA in the 1970s and has always shown a willingness to volunteer as President, Texas Federation of Fiber Artists representative, Show Committee member, program presenter, and annual workshop teacher.
 
She was awarded the Outstanding Long Time Member Award in May, 2018 to honor her decades of service to DAFA. She is currently Parliamentarian to the Board.

My Heart is Full Sachet

With Lila Warman's help, we will create a fragrant stuffed heart for closet, drawer or gift. Use it as a reminder that we are worth taking a moment to smell the roses? You choose your preferred aroma.

Lila is our Membership Director. She is a self-made crafter. She has never seen a craft she didn’t want to try. She has worked with embroidery and cross-stitching since she was a little girl. She enjoys sewing and made a lot of her daughters’ clothes when they were little.

Recently Lila has discovered the art of card making. Lila made felted Calla Lilies for a wedding along with other fun items. She has shared the love of crafting with the Girl Scout troops and day camps she lead over 20 years. Lila was the Activity Coordinator for Newcomer Friends of Greater Plano in 2015. She also lead a group called Handmade By Me 2016-2018.

Artful iPhone Photo Editing

Kathi Jahnke gives us an introduction to iPhone photo effects apps and how to create abstract images from your original photos. Shown is art by Kathi using this technique.

Kathi is the newest member of our board. She serves as Program Director.

Kathi is a mixed media fiber artist who enjoys creating art quilts based on digital manipulation of her photography. She is an artist member of SAQA and has contributed several works to their trunk shows and traveling exhibitions. Her work has also been featured in Quilting Arts and Cloth Paper Scissors magazines.

Thrilled to have found a new creative home with DAFA, Kathi brings ten years of experience developing and directing visual arts programs including launching Art at Concordia and serving as the Director of OSilas Gallery at Concordia College in Bronxville, New York.